Closing the door to the past and better dealing with what was lost.

In the search for personal freedom, inner expansion and living true to who we are, looking at and dealing with our past is important. Having the clarity of what has shaped and influenced us, can ease the path of undoing inner restrictions. It may allow us to better let go of ideas and emotional entanglements that reduce our sense of ease and well-being.

Being aware of our past and giving it attention when needed, can remind us and revive qualities we may think were lost.

But looking back and dealing with the past needs to be done with attention, a clear intention and care. When we look back, we have to make sure that within ourselves we do not stay trapped in it. We are not tempted to hold on to blame or a self-reassuring sense of victimhood.

The temptation is tricky and the holding onto blame may sneak on us unknowingly. It is often when we try to get rid of what seems unpleasant for us, thinking it is outside of us.

Or we may find ourselves holding that door so tightly closed. Slamming it with constant anger. Leaning against it, afraid of the monsters that might enter if we let go for a moment. This is also no freedom.

The path of healing and strengthening ourselves is demanding one. It demands discipline.

There is no doubt that many of us were wronged. Many were victims of circumstances into which they were born. Victims of no intent. Of the short comings of our parents and others around us.

But we should not forget that we all have survived. We all live, today.

And as being alive we all face a future that invites us to meet it with well-being.

The future is an open invitation and has no demands or restrictions. It is an “open club” that welcomes everyone.

It holds no judgement and asks for no special conditions. All it does is shine the light on who we are. It shines a light on us and wants only us. If we bring the past with us, our future will not be able to give us the well-being that awaits us at his gates.

The future, knows that we are complete. It has no doubt that we are enough. That we have all that we need within us to find well-being. All that enables us to find our fulfillment and to taste life as much as we chose to open our buds.

The Now is in our hands. It is the moment in which we make sure we close the door to the past. That we walk away without carrying even the smallest piece of it.

The past is like a gentle vail that drops to the floor without resistance once we make that step forward. Once we remember our strength and the life that flows through us.

Once we agree to be felt and feel.

Each time we manage to do that we ensure that the future that we step into, is one of well-being and inner freedom.

Closing the door to the past is often experienced as a puzzle of doors; In some parts of our lives we have been able to move away easily and in others not.

On top of that, the past is seducing to stay within its comfort of the known “just a little longer”. But those seductive moments tend to become a honey trap, where the wings of our soul and unlimited abilities get sticky and useless.

So how do we do that?

Closing is finding completion.

Closing the door is not about forgetting the past nor ignoring it.

Closing the door is the ability to deal with loss. With an ending.

Everything of the past is in some way lost in time. Gone.

Often the areas we get trapped in the past or obsessed about what we have experienced in the past, are connected to some kind of loss we could not deal with. It can be a loss of a person, a lack and loss of so needed love and support. Loss of self-confidence or loss of a home. These can be few examples for you to draw from.

Think of when and how do you tend to be attached to the past?

When do you feel that the hurtful or shaming experiences of your past dominate the way you react today?

Ways that do not bring you well-being and ease?

When you think of those moments in your life, what kind of loss can you link to it?

In which way do you feel and still convinced you are a victim of this loss?

When you are keep being attached to a continuous thought that it all had to be different for you, it may be a part of being attached to the past and imprinting that loss into your being deeper and deeper and deeper.

Mourning and hurting what was not in your favor in the past is needed. But mourning is the way we cry the loss back into the ground. To water it with our tears for new growth and the new shape it can take and blossom into.

True mourning does not leave a hole. It allows the structures of what we love and need to shift and change to new ones.

Mourning is for the sake of bringing new life rather than being drowned in the loss and pain of it.

Take time to remember what you have lost.

Feel how the memory is still burning in your body.

Feel where are you starting to contract, smaller or weaken your body.

Where and how are you drowning in that loss rather than giving it space.

Remember that you should be the fertile alive soil for it to sink into. Into your heart and body to awake something new.

This is the beauty of our capacity as humans. Of the realms of experience and connections that can shift and change if we let them.

Now stay for a moment with that restrictive reaction in your body.

Feel what is it that you are trying to hold on to.

What are you trying to do the longing and pain that are part of the initial experience of the loss?

Are you fantasizing about how it all could have been?

Are you returning to anger and blame? How is that blame feel like? What do you do in order to keep it alive with in you? How does the blame give you a sensation of control? And how does it really feel in your body? does it give you a sense of freedom? Well being? Ease? Does it give you the strength to tend to what you love?

Keep on staying in that way of being. Hold on to it.

Do you feel that if you would let it go, all of who you are will die with it? that you will crumble into a pile of weakness? That holding is the way you stay safe?

Give yourself time to be in that place consciously. Be aware of the cognitive loop you are in- a sentence that repeats, a conviction. An atmosphere that seems to suffocate you.

Allow any emotion and sensation to increase.

And then let it all go. Breathe deeply couple of times and release any of that effort as much as you can.

And just say out loud: and now what?

And now what?

And now what?

Stay aware of your breath and your body.

Feel the option of letting go of more tension in your body and if there is a wave of tears and sadness that needs to wash over you just let it be.

Try to be open in your breath, your chest and your belly.

Try to let go of your eyes, jaw and ears.

Pay attention and try to experience the space around you and the way it can open all around you.

Allow the question “and now what?” to linger, breath and do not try to know.

Try to stay disciplined in not answering it in your mind with what you know.

Let the experience of letting go, of dropping what you hold and of feeling the space around you, to bring you an answer. Either in an experience that feels well, or with an idea…

Let the door of the past close. See it, hear it and feel it closing behind you, while you drop efforts in your shoulders, chest and legs.

Take time to rest and decide to keep that door closed.

Don’t fight that closing. Resist in your body to any need to do hold on to the door open or be active.

And the moment before it closes completely decide what you want to leave behind it and what you want to revive and take with you.

With that I leave you to allow the welcoming future to open up for you and the past to peacefully rest at your back.

Yours

Anna

P.s Listen to closing the door to the past this is a free audio training for you on the subject

Photo by Roan Lavery on Unsplash